Family files $2 million claim after trolley track bike death

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SEATTLE — The same accident on the same corner on the same day—a year apart.

For Suzanne Greenberg, a trip down the hill to a job as sign language interpreter day shouldn’t have ended in pain.

“Sprained, hurt it, somehow, scraped my arm. I can`t move my arm,” she said shortly after being launched off her bike after her tire slipped into the First Hill streetcar trolley track at Yesler and 13th Avenue on Wednesday.

She went to an urgent care on Capitol Hill, but a similar accident took the life of cyclist Desiree McCloud a year ago in the same spot in 2016.

“They knew. They knew that this new streetcar track would kill someone,” said Desiree’s brother Cody.

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Cody and his family don't know Greenberg, but they know the same dangers on the tracks.

“They put it in, they left it as-is, and now my sister`s dead,” McCloud said.

An aspiring scientist with hopes to work at the Allen institute, Cody said Desiree loved Magic the Gathering, and proof is in the the cards now draping the bike she rode the day of the accident.

The family's attorneys say the city knew the gap in the tracks for the streetcar were dangerous, and that rubber inserts used in other cities were an option---but weren't used.

“Had that been done, where Desiree McCloud had been riding her bike, she`d be alive today,” said lawyer Philp Arnold.

Their $2 millionclaim targets Seattle and Sound Transit, who partially funded the project. Sound Transit said they merely paid for portions of the project and Seattle operates the streetcar and tracks. The city couldn’t comment now that the claim has been filed.